Lexington pastor ranks high with Twitter followers

LEXINGTON, Ky. (WKYT) - We met Pastor Ron Edmondson at North Lime Coffee and Donuts in Lexington. He says he is a regular there. He stops in a couple of times a week. He goes to be a part of the community, but also to spread his beliefs-- from his computer.

"A lot of times people say, How did you get so many followers? I don't really know. I just happened to be there at the right time and right place," Edmondson said.

He has almost 114,000 Twitter followers. Which makes him third on the list of most followed twitterers who call Lexington home, according to Twittaholic.com."With Twitter, it's all about the connections," Edmondson said. "You start getting some reasonably well known names in the Christian world to retweet you or mention you in a post, and that builds your audience."

Edmondson says he got in early on the social media craze. Email blasts he sent out in the 1990s turned into Blogs over time, and that led to a Facebook and Twitter presence that puts the pastor into the homes and phones of thousands of followers."I realized when they get to participate in my life, they feel like they are with me more than just Sunday."

On Sundays, he stands before a congregation of close to 2000 at Immanuel Baptist Church in Lexington. But he knows there are bigger numbers to minister past the brick and mortar."We built big buildings but people are not coming anymore. So I keep telling our church, we've got to go to them. We've got to go where they are."

His online ministry, Edmondson says, may have started by chance, but it's growing intentionally, with the belief that his Christian words will be followed --and faith will grow."If I'm truly going to be a kingdom builder, then I have to go where the people are."

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